01-03-2020, 11:15 PM
(01-03-2020, 01:03 AM)DONJCH Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Although this is interesting, I am wondering what is the use of an isolated gate in the wilderness unless it is defended by a garrison?
In versions which I'm yet to refer to, Alexander comes to two mountains and makes a prayer to God to bring those mountains close to each other so that he could build a gate between them. It would have been more rational to ask God to just merge the mountains to shut the pass altogether, but... true kings are not looking for royal roads!
But it's not "wilderness". People live there (with whom Alexander has talks and some business), it's the realm of a certain Persian king Tubarlak (as he's called in the Christian Legend), and in the Discourse Alexander even fights the army of this Tubarlak (here called Tubarliki) and 62 other kings, and he kills the latter and captures the former alive.
But yes, that's an interesting point. Instead of a gate he could made an impenetrable wall which would serve the purpose. That's what he does in the Quran, indeed.
Anderson, after Noeldeke, considers the Christian Legend the principal source of the story of Dhu 'l-Qarnayn (the "Two-Horned One") in Surah 18 of the Quran. Dhu 'l-Qarnayn is generally regarded to represent Alexander, although some researchers are of differing opinion, e.g. they think he's King Darius or someone else. The respective passage (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. by Abdel Haleem) is conveniently copy-pasted:
Quote:[Prophet], they ask you about Dhu ’l-Qarnayn. Say, ‘I will tell you something about him.’ We established his power in the land, and gave him the means to achieve everything. He travelled on a certain road; then, when he came to the setting of the sun, he found it [seemed to be] setting into a muddy spring. Nearby he found some people and We said, ‘Dhu ’l-Qarnayn, you may choose [which of them] to punish or show kindness to.’ He answered, ‘We shall punish those who have done evil, and when they are returned to their Lord He will punish them [even more] severely, while those who believed and did good deeds will have the best of rewards: we shall command them to do what is easy for them.’ He travelled on; then, when he came to the rising of the sun, he found it rising on a people for whom We had provided no shelter from it. And so it was: We knew all about him. He travelled on; then, when he reached a place between two mountain barriers, he found beside them a people who could barely understand him. They said, ‘Dhu ’l-Qarnayn, Gog and Magog are ruining this land. Will you build a barrier between them and us if we pay you a tribute?’ He answered, ‘The power my Lord has given me is better than any tribute, but if you lend me your strength, I will put up a fortification between you and them: bring me lumps of iron!’ and then, when he had filled the gap between the two mountainsides [he said], ‘Work your bellows!’ and then, when he had made it glow like fire, he said, ‘Bring me molten metal to pour over it!’ Their enemies could not scale the barrier, nor could they pierce it, and he said, ‘This is a mercy from my Lord. But when my Lord’s promise is fulfilled, He will raze this barrier to the ground: my Lord’s promise always comes true.
Interestingly, Anderson uses the classical 18th century You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. by Sale, in which 18:91 is translated as "And he prosecuted his journey from south to north", whereas in the modern translation quoted above it is simply "he travelled on". Anderson does not take note that "from south to north" is printed in italics meaning that this phrase is inserted by the translator. Sale provides an explanatory footnote as to why he decided to introduce particulars, but anyway it's not said in the Quran that Alexander-Dhu ’l-Qarnayn traveled from south to north, it's just Sale's speculation. But Anderson takes it at face value and concludes that the "gate" (or, as we see, literally a barrier), instead of being built in its due place of the pass of Dariel, is built in extreme north-east, since Alexander first traveled to the region where the sun rises (meaning some extreme east), and then from that point he (as Anderson believes based on Sale's dubious manner of translation) traveled to the north (which, in the real Quran, he did not do). This false interpretation Anderson then carries forward to the later two chapters of his book where he discusses the location shift of the gate exhibited as the legend develops through centuries.
Another misconception about the gate in the Quran is in the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. by van Donzel and Schmidt, where they say (p. 21) that in Quran the motif is found whereby on Alexander's request, the mountains are moved towards each other. As we just saw, this is not true. That's a bit strange, given that they dedicate a whole chapter 3 to this story in the Quran.
Anderson also provides a quote from ibn Thabit, a contemporary of Muhammad, translation by Nicholson. I post it here as well, because I like it:
Quote:Ours the realm of Dhu ’l-Qarnayn the glorious,
Realm like his was never won by mortal king.
Followed he the sun to view its setting
When it sank into the sombre ocean spring;
Up he clomb to see it rise at morning,
From within its mansion when the East it fired;
All day long the horizons led him onward.
All night through he watched the stars and never tired.
Then of iron and of liquid metal
He prepared a rampart not to be o’erpassed,
Gog and Magog there he threw in prison
Till on Judgement Day they shall awake at last.
In Quran, the barrier is built of iron and "molten metal"; van Donzel and Schmidt also quote (p.87) the Tafsir by al Qummi, the 10th century commenter on Quran, according to whom the gate (literally the gate) was made of copper, iron, pitch and tar.
Next we move to the major group of sources, the so-called pseudo-Callisthenes, where at last some innovative substance appears. I will post about that later.